s he supposed, may indeed be open
to much question, but there can be no doubt that most of the English
statesmen who carried the Irish agrarian legislation sincerely believed
it, and some of them imagined that they were giving a security and
finality to the property which was left, that would indemnify the
plundered landlords. Perhaps, under such circumstances, the most that
can be said is that wise legislators will endeavour, by encouraging
purchase on a large scale, gradually to restore the absolute ownership
and the validity of contract which have been destroyed, and at the same
time to compensate indirectly--if they cannot do it directly--the former
owners for that portion of their losses which is not due to merely
economical causes, but to acts of the legislature that were plainly
fraudulent.

There are other temptations of a different kind with which party leaders
have to deal. One of the most serious is the tendency to force questions
for which there is no genuine desire, in order to restore the unity or
the zeal of a divided or dispirited party. As all politicians know, the
desire for an attractive programme and a popular election cry is one of
the strongest in politics, and, as they also know well, there is such a
thing as manufactured public opinion and artificially stimulated
agitation. Questions are raised and pushed, not because they are for the
advantage of the country, but simply for the purposes of party. The
leaders have often little or no power of resistance. The pressure of
their followers, or of a section of their followers, becomes
irresistible; ill-considered hopes are held out; rash pledges are
extorted, and the party as a whole is committed. Much premature and
mischievous legislation may be traced to such causes.

Another very difficult question is the manner in which governments
should deal with the acts of public servants which are intended for the
public service, but which in some of their parts are morally
indefensible. Very few of the great acquisitions of nations have been
made by means that were absolutely blameless, and in a great empire
which has to deal with uncivilised or semi-civilised populations acts of
violence are certain to be not infrequent. Neither in our judgments of
history nor in our judgments of contemporaries is it possible to apply
the full stringency of private morals to the cases of men acting in
posts of great responsibility and danger amid the storms of revolution,